1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to locking astragals for application in double doorways. The astragal is fastened to one of the doors which is primarily retained in a fixed, closed position within the door frame.
2. Description of Related Art
Double entrance doorways are often used in residential homes or business suites for their functional as well as aesthetic characteristics. Typically, one of the doors in the double doorway usually remains shut and is fixed to the door frame by various types of bolts and/or locking mechanisms. This fixed door is generally referred to as the inactive leaf. The other free-swinging door, or active leaf, is commonly used as the main entrance door through which people can enter. If large objects such as furniture or the like must pass through the entrance, the normally inactive leaf of the doorway can be readily unbolted from the door frame so that both doors can be opened to create a wide entrance way through which the furniture or other object may pass.
Generally, the mating edges of double doors do not directly contact each other, but are separated by an astragal. Typically, the astragal is attached to the edge of the inactive leaf and extends the length of the door. The astragal cushions the closing of the active leaf of the doorway and seals gaps between the two doors.
Astragals commonly include upper and lower bolt-slide assemblies which include locking bolts that slide within the upper and lower ends of the astragal. The bolts can be pushed outwardly to extend beyond the ends of the astragal. The bolts when extended are received by upper and lower apertures in the upper and lower sections of the door frame, also known as the header and threshold sill, respectively, to lock the inactive leaf in place.
Many bolt-slide assemblies have knobs which facilitate manually sliding the bolts to lock the bolts into the door frame. The knobs are usually flush with the edge of the door so that they do not protrude out of the door thereby obstructing the closing of the opposite door, but the knobs may be designed to be pulled out from the edge of the door frame to provide greater leverage for manual adjustment of the bolt. However, knobs which are attached directly to the bolt are often difficult to reach and manipulate.
To allow easier access to and adjustment of the bolts, the bolt-slide assemblies of some astragal devices have extension cables and spring components which allow the bolts to be manipulated near the center of the door edge. For example, one door latch device has a cable attached at one end to the bolt and, at the other end, to a sliding retractor which can be manipulated to retract the bolt via the cable. The extension cable which connects the bolt to the manual retractor allows the retractor to be at an easily accessible height near the center of the door. A spring is typically located between each cable and bolt to bias the bolt in an outwardly extended, locked position. As the retractor is pulled inward, the spring stretches as the bolt is retracted. When the retractors are released or pushed outward, the bolt will snap outward into the extended, locked position as the tension on the spring is dissipated.
Many retractors have a latching mechanism which allows the bolt to be latched in the inward, retracted position. In one latching arrangement, a thin, elongated metal latch bar is housed within a plastic retractor housing, or pull block. One end of the latch bar protrudes from the top of the pull block and pivots about a pin within the pull block. The other end of the latch bar has a small protrusion which fits into a circular hole in a bottom plate to lock the retractor in place. A compression spring, located between the underside of the housing and the unexposed end of the latch, biases the latch bar in the downwardly locking position in the hole in the bottom plate.
When the protruding end of the latch bar is depressed, the latch bar pivots about the pin, simultaneously compressing the spring and releasing the protrusion from its locked position in the bottom plate. The retractor is thereby released, allowing the door bolt to slide outwardly into the extended locked position. Such latching mechanisms, however, are relatively complicated to manufacture and assemble and are susceptible to increased mechanical failures resulting from the multiple individual components.
In another aspect of locking astragal assemblies, one or more strike plates are provided near the center of the astragal to fit around an opening or channel in the astragal through which bolts of a door lock or dead bolt mechanism in the opposing active leaf can pass to securely lock the doors together. Typically, the strike plate must be carefully adjusted to precisely align with the door lock and dead bolt which may have already been installed in the active leaf.
A variety of methods are used to align the strike plate on the astragal with the door lock and bolt in the opposing door. For example, in one trial-and-error method, the strike plate is hand-adjusted to exactly line up with the door bolt so that the door lock and dead bolt can close and lock properly with the opposite door. After it appears that the proper alignment has been achieved, holes are drilled in the astragal or spacers in the astragal to install the strike plate. If the alignment was not properly achieved, the holes for the strike plate typically need to be redrilled. Thus, numerous holes may be unnecessarily drilled in the surface of the astragal casing or spacers to receive the strike plate screws.
In some instances, it may be necessary to realign the entire astragal so that a bolt can fit within and through the bolt channel formed in the astragal. It can be readily appreciated that such trial-and-error methods can be time consuming and therefore expensive.